


The Good Son

by ShadeCrawler



Category: Batman - All Media Types
Genre: Gen, joker dies
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-12-11
Updated: 2020-12-11
Packaged: 2021-03-11 05:20:36
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: Major Character Death
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,542
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/28009869
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/ShadeCrawler/pseuds/ShadeCrawler
Summary: Tim Drake was the Good Son™. He didn't break rules, especially Batman's rules. He would never.Expect, maybe, to save a family member.
Relationships: Tim Drake & Damian Wayne, Tim Drake & Jason Todd
Comments: 10
Kudos: 271





	The Good Son

“Jesus fucking _Christ_ , what the fuck were you even _thinking?!_ Why didn’t you fucking _call me?!”_

Tim was only half listening to Jason’s rant, staring down at the floor with a numb expression. He was holding a sleeping Damian close to him as Jason ranted, the hand holding the back of Damian’s head shaking slightly. “I don’t know,” he whispered. He was still wearing his Red Robin uniform, the uniform uncomfortable with the blood caked on the front. “I . . . I don’t think I even was thinking.”

“No fucking shit,” Jason snapped, running his fingers through his hair with a slightly panicked and frustrated expression on his face. “It wasn’t supposed to be you, it was supposed to be me. It was _never_ supposed to be _you.”_

Tim laughed, a tad hysterically. “Looks like I stole another job from you.”

“Shut the fuck up!” Jason glared at him. “Be fucking serious! We have maybe a half-hour before Bats shows up and drags you off to Arkham and drags Damian back to the manor and be interrogated on why he didn’t stop you. We need to figure out what we’re going to do about this shitty fucking situation,” he hissed.

“What’s there to figure out? I didn’t exactly try and hide what I did. I threw the knife in the closest river, but I was,” panicking. Tim had definitely been panicking. He had thrown the knife into the closest river, grabbed the hurt, exhausted, and scared Damian and had just _run_. He had insistently run to Jason’s house, unsure of where else he should go. “Bruce is gonna know exactly who did this.”

“Which is why we have to get a fucking _plan_ together. I have safe houses around Gotham, but we want you out of Gotham. Probably Damian too while we’re going. We don’t want anyone blaming him for what happened.”

And why wouldn’t they? Damian was the easiest target to pin for murder. He was the ex-assassin, son of a current assassin, and grandson to _Ra’s al Ghul_. They wouldn’t think that this eleven-year-old kid just happened to be there when it happened. No one would care that Damian was being beaten to death and couldn’t move even if he wanted to. And who would care that Damian would rather die than break the one rule that both of his Batmen had insisted on? No one. Maybe Bruce?

But Tim? He really doubted that anyone would suspect him. Even Bruce would probably doubt that he did this, or at least he’d do everything he could to deny it. Tim was the Good Son™. Tim was the Good Robin. He’d never kill anyone. He’d never go against Bruce’s one rule, not even when pushed. Even if someone tried beating his little brother to death right in front of him. Even if that person was the guy who had beaten another brother to death, had tried killing everyone Tim had ever loved and himself a million times before. No, Tim would never do that in a million years.

Yeah. That really went to show how many people really knew Tim.

“Maybe Canada,” Tim asked numbly, going along with this insane plan. Did it really matter where they ran? This was _Batman_ there were talking about here. He’d find Tim eventually; he knew that he would. And was running away really going to help his case? He really doubted that it would. Maybe if Dick was still alive then he’d understand. Maybe he’d be able to talk Bruce out of chasing Tim down. But Dick was dead. He was _dead_. So, he couldn’t even take Damian and look after him as Tim ran from Bruce. “Or . . . that’s too obvious, isn’t it? Maybe . . . Italy? Damian really liked Italy when we went there on a mission.”

Jason nodded absentmindedly. “Good idea. Get a small house, nothing too fancy or shit. Nothing that will make anyone notice you. Get a haircut, dye it, get contacts. All of that. Get rid of your Gotham accent, make Damian learn an Italian accent. Wait, the little shit probably already has an Italian accent down pat. Tell him to start using it. And to act like a regular eleven-year-old and all that. Blend in.”

“This isn’t my first time doing something like this, Jason.”

“Yeah, but you’re disappearing for real this time, Tim,” Jason snapped, glaring at him. “You can’t afford any fuck ups.”

Tim nodded, pulling Damian a little closer to him. Damian’s Robin uniform was thrown on the floor and he was wearing some sweats that Jason kept at his apartment for him. They had both started trying to be better big brothers after Damian had come back to life. “I know. I know. We’re going to have to get passports, money, paperwork. I have money squirrelled away in a bank account that Bruce shouldn’t know about –“

“Take all the money out and close it. Make a new one and put money in slowly, not all at once. Get a job and keep your head down.”

“Right. Right.” Tim let out a shaky breath. “Damian . . . shouldn’t we wait for him to wake up? Ask him what he wants. He might want to –“

“I’m staying with you.”

Tim forced himself not to jump at Damian’s sudden voice, looking down at the boy. Damian’s eyes were still close, and he looked as relaxed as he had asleep. The only thing that gave him away was how tightly he was gripping Tim’s cape. “I’m staying with you.”

Jason shrugged, smirking at Tim in that, ‘Little-Brothers-am-I-right?’ way. “I guess that settles that,” he said. “C’mon, let’s get moving. The Bat won’t stay away forever, and we have a lot of shit to do.”

* * *

* * *

* * *

“Why didn’t you go home, Damian?”

The two of them were on a 3am plane ride to Venice Italy, Damian curled up in his window seat and Tim with his face angled away from the cameras and focused on the magazine he’d been reading for the past half hour. They were low enough to the ground that the tops of Gotham buildings were still visible. He wondered which ones his family was running over tonight.

Damian glanced up at him behind newly dyed brown hair and dark contact lenses. The makeup that Jason had caked him with hid the fresh bruises from just a few hours ago but none of it hid the slight hesitance in Damian’s eyes. “Did you not want me to come with you, _Lucca_ ,” he asked pointedly, using the fake name that the two of them had come with.

“You know that’s not what I mean, _Mateo_ ,” Tim shot back. “Why did you come with me?”

There was a long pause where Damian stared out the window. Wayne Tower was visible from where they were, looming above most of Gotham. “. . . You didn’t have to do that,” he finally whispered. “I would’ve understood. I really would’ve. Or you could’ve defeated him without violence. Do you regret it?”

Tim didn’t answer right away. Could he of? He hadn’t been hit with a crowbar like Damian had been – because of course that sick Fuck had to stay on brand – but he had been beaten pretty soundly by Jokers’ goons. Forced to just watch Damian be hit over and over and _over_ again. Knowing that Damian had just come back, but he might be lost to them all over. And even if he had managed to defeat the Joker without killing him, the goons surrounding him were obviously eager to take out Robin just as much as the Clown was. Joker had called them off because he had wanted to finish the job, but would the goons had stayed away from the bird while Tim fought their boss off?

When he had broken free of a goon’s hold, he had just _run_ at the Joker. Looking back, he had no idea what he was thinking. He didn’t even know where he had gotten the knife from. A goon? The floor? His utility belt? Tim had no idea. The next thing that he knew, he was running away from a warehouse full of rioting minions hellbent on killing Tim with a wheezing Damian in his arms.

But _did_ he regret it? He regretted what came from it. Stealing Damian away in the middle of the night, running away from his friends and family and leaving them with a mess that he had made. But Damian hadn’t asked that. He had asked Tim if he regretted the act itself. And killing the man who had killed Jason, crippled Barbara, destroyed whole families or taken away major parts of them, psychologically tortured them for shits and giggles, and had tried to kill Damian just about five hours ago?

“No. No, I don’t think I do.” Tim wrapped an arm around Damian and pulled him closer to his side.

It was time to think about what came next. The Clown Prince of Gotham was dead, and his blood was on Tim’s hands. But his younger brother was alive, and Tim was at least three steps ahead of anyone who came after them. Right now, all they had to do was focus on the plane ride. They’d figure out what to do next when they landed.


End file.
